No Such River In My Mind
by ShadowSpires
Summary: It had been 4 Months. And Arthur was still refusing to think about it.
AN: Oh my god this is so old! Moving from my Ao3 because I didn't realize it wasn't on FF. Pretty much only leaving this up for posterity's sake... Ugh.

Original notes:

Seriously? No idea where this came from. Also, unbetaed, my first fic in the Merlin fandom; hell, when I wrote it it was my first fic at all in what, years? Also, written in about an hour, so, yeah. I've only watched some of each season, and read a lot of fic, so I'm hoping Arthur's not hopelessly out of character... (In re-reading now months later I can see Merlin's voice isn't right either, but I'm being lazy and not editing right now. Maybe later.)  
I..honestly have no idea where this came from. It wasn't supposed to be like this. It was supposed to be a lot longer, and, well, happy. Really. But, well, it just kind of ran away with me. I may come back to it later and add to it, make it more like I originally intended, but well, this is what it seemed to want to be, so who am I to argue? X-posted to my livejournal, if by bizarre chance you've been there and this looks familiar. Constructive criticism always welcome.

It had been 4 months.

It hardly seemed possibly. It felt like it had been... _hours, years, days, centuries, minutes, weeks, seconds, eternity._ The world felt out of place, out of sync, or maybe he was out of step with the world? It had been like that ever since-.

 _No_ .

Arthur poked listlessly at his food, and glared at the hapless servant who was stoking his fire. The man turned around and flinched when he caught sight of Arthur's glare. Arthur felt a twinge of guilt before he ruthlessly suppressed it - and the glare - and gestured the servant out. He fled; silently, as he had done everything else since he took over Merlin's-

Arthur flinched away from that thought. He cast about for anything to take his mind off..that which he didn't wish to think about.

He took an absent-minded sip of ale as his gaze flitted around his chambers; his spotlessly neat chambers. Everything was in it's place, there was no clothing tucked into corners in the hopes Arthur wouldn't see it, there was no dust under the bed, his meals were cleared away promptly when he was through, and his baths were always the perfect temperature. His servants always came and went unobtrusively; unseen, unheard.

Arthur hated it.

His quarters used to be filled unexpectedly with inane chatter that somehow managed to distract him from what ever had gone wrong that day. After he had gotten over the supreme bemusement of a servant who not only stepped over the boundaries, but didn't seem to even be aware of their existence in the first place, it had been a comfort. His quarters had changed from a place of solitude to a place of..truth, where he could really be himself with one of the few people who saw _Arthur_ first, long before he saw Prince Arthur, Crown Prince of Camelot. If he ever saw him that way at all; Merlin had the most annoying, infuriating, endearing habit of seeing _him_ and believing in him, that he could be more than just his father's son. Merlin would have been-

 _No_ . He would not continue to think about it.

His eyes went to the one thing which had not changed about his quarters. His armor was properly hung on the rack and shining softly in the firelight. Merlin, after a few false starts, had always been diligent about Arthur's armor. He complained, and moaned but in the end Arthur's armor was always perfect; no rust, no dents, no flaws. Always strong enough to protect Arthur from whatever the next threat might be. Merlin was always so willing to do what ever he could to protect Arthur; lie, sneak, steal, even throw himself headlong, heedlessly into danger, as if the world couldn't touch him, as if he held all the cards; risking his life again and again, all of it to protect Arthur.

The mug in his hand connected with the wall before he even realized an intent to throw it, and he watched the liquid trail down to the floor.

He could almost hear Merlin's voice in his head. _"Now, what did you have to go and do that for!"_ He'd exclaim, indignant. _"I just finished scrubbing those walls!"_ and he'd glare at Arthur as he fetched a rag to sop up the mess, completely ignoring that one did not _glare_ at the Crown Prince, and Arthur would toss a piece of bread to stick on the wall while Merlin's back was turned, just to annoy him. Merlin would glare and grumble, Arthur would tease and laugh and his chambers would be, at least for that moment, a place of light, and laughter, a place where all of the demands of princely duties and his fathers expectations couldn't touch him and he could just... _be_ .

He folded forward abruptly, shoulders bowing forward as he rested elbows on knees, fingers fisting in golden hair, as if his head was suddenly too heavy to support unaided. He could imagine Merlin's mocking laughter echoing through the chambers if he'd heard that thought. _"I told you sire!,"_ he'd laugh, _"That if you kept thinking so highly of yourself your head would swell right up. I read all about it in one of Gaius's books! You'd stop being able to walk through doorways soon enough, get too heavy for your horse! This is just the first step; this is why you need me around; to keep your head from getting too swelled; it's for your own good you see! You need me!"_

"I do need you, Merlin!"

The sentiment was ripped from him to rattle around the empty chambers, torn from a part of him that didn't exist before it was filled with irrepressible cheer, and stupid ears and laughter and loyalty and stupid, stupid, unthinking bravery. A part of him he didn't know about until all of that was ripped away from him and all he had left was the echo of those things, bouncing around a hole inside of him. Leaving him so empty in a way he could never have imagined.

He glanced around the room, almost expecting Merlin to appear, to give him that retarded, watery grin he always had after they had a 'moment'; just before he tried to go in for a hug.

Maybe he should have let him have one. The thought felt vaguely wistful. He'd wanted to, occasionally, and one hug surely couldn't have hurt anything in the grand scheme of things, could it? Maybe with one sign of...of... _something_ and Merlin would have told him, could have let him know _before_ -

 _NO_ . He was **_not thinking about this._** He **_wasn't._**

It was cold.

Though his seat close to the fire kept him warm enough, he could see the frost edging the windows. It gave the night a dream like feel, as the moon shone bright on this cloudless night. The snow piled in sparking drifts about the courtyard and anyone who had to be out and about was doing so quickly. The guards had short rotations tonight; everyone switching indoor duty for outdoor more regularly that normal, with hot tea and soup constantly on offer in the small kitchen, the patrol route passed. It left the defenses a little weaker for their constant state of flux, but not as weak as they would have been for guards freezing to death or falling ill and being unable to perform their duties on the next day. The smaller weakness, recognized and accommodated for would insure that those that served would be kept as comfortable as possible while still keeping Camelot safe.

It had been Merlin's idea, actually, the shorter rotations, though he didn't know it. It had been the first winter Merlin had spent in Camelot, with Arthur, and he had taken exception to the amount of outdoor duties Arthur had assigned him in a fit of pique. Arthur had come back to his room for some peace, fully expecting his idiot, annoying new manservant to be occupied away from here to find the stupid boy puttering around his quarters, straightening up. He had, of course, started yelling and, to his continued bemusement, the boy had yelled back. _"Yeah, I could go out there and work straight through that bloody ridiculous list of things you told me to do_ out there _in the_ freezing cold _and you could_ find _my_ frozen corpse _come_ springtime _or, if it's not too much trouble for you,_ sire, _I could intersperse f_ reezing for no good reason _with doing things that_ actually _need to be done_ inside _where it's_ warm, _and live in joyous servitude for another day!"_

Arthur had, of course assigned him extra duties outside, just for that, but had made no further comment on his manservant's coming and goings, even when his comings were heralded by chattering teeth and longer periods stoking the fire than could possibly be necessary, and his goings were marked by muttered curses he probably though the prince could not hear.

And when the next day, after a particularly brutally cold night, their patrols were short-handed as a result of the many guards down with illness or mild frostbite he remembered Merlin's strategy and, after pitching it to his father carefully, instated it to the great relief of the guard. Merlin had had such a fresh outlook on everything; any other servant would have just completed the chores assigned without complaint, and Arthur would not have a clever new way to keep Camelot safe and his guards healthy and whole. Merlin had really had no idea-

"No. Nonononononono. I am done, through, _I am not thinking about this."_ Arthur stated this very firmly to his empty chambers. Glaring around as though waiting for an impertinent voice to express it's opinion that that shouldn't be very hard as he never appeared to think about much of anything.

"Arrrrghhh!" With a wordless sound of frustration Arthur shot to his feet, stuffed his feet back into his boots (cleaned and oiled and perfect), snatched his warm fur coat (pulled from storage and aired and ready for him long before he would have thought to ask for it) from it's place by the door and stomped out of his room.

Maybe a walk would clear his head; rid it of images of golden, glowing eyes in a heartbroken face, hand outstretched, holding lightening at bay by will alone; of his father's furious eyes glinting with unreasoning hate, harsh voice ordering the arrest of the first person to really make Arthur think about what it would mean to be king, the first person he could truly a call friend. The door slammed shut on empty chambers, no longer a place of laughter, just a place of ghosts.

TBC?


End file.
